THE BLACK HALO

This is just epic stuff. Really good, epic stuff. The songwriting is tight and consistant throughout, the songs really give you an epic feel and the playing is solid. The vocals are quite good and the usage of keyboards and that orchestral feel is done masterfully. All around, this album doesn't scream "OMG", it more just reeks of polish, overproduction and overall yells "SOLID!". There's nothing that stands out about this album, but everything is consitently excellent throughout.

Kamelot's whole sound revolves around a march tempo and sometimes faster 4:00 orchestrated song following the standard verse-chorus-verse-chorus format. The playing allows for plenty of headbanging, and the vocals are great to song along to... my brother and I can vouch for that. Just imagine a powerful but desperate warrior in the middle ages marching with sword in hand against foes of darkness while trying to satisfy a woman and a god, of course. Marching towards hell with heaven on his back. Just epic metal AKA power metal. The last three albums, I think, have actually been concept albums, but I don't care enough to discover what it is. The lyrics are, of course, cheesy, and the singing can get cheesy, but it's far better than the last two albums. And Khan's voice fits the style perfectly.

There's really no point in talking about songs, since they mostly sound the same, but worth noting are the interludes. There are three interludes, which are mostly just breaks to try out something different. One has a part sung a cappella and it soudns awful, but that's ok. The rest of the songs follow the formula described above with greta success. Standouts are the opening track, March of Mephisto (featuring demonic vocals from Shagrath of Dimmu Borgir, heh), Moonlight, The Haunting (Somewhere in Time), and When The Lights Are Down, which is actually a lot faster than the normal Kamelot song on this album.

Normally I'd give such a formulaic album as this a 3/5, but Kamelot's formula is done with such a high level of mastery that I must give it 4/5. Reccomended to anyone looking for some good, straight-forward epic stuff with plenty of headbanging involved.